IAHPC Traveling Scholar’s Report - Romania
Meeting a hospital based palliative care team in the University Clinic of Navarra
By Dana Oana Donea, MD
“Nicholas Edeleanu” Resource Centre for Hospice and Palliative Care
Bucharest, Romania
In Bucharest , two new palliative care projects are starting as hospital based teams. One starts now and is for adults, and the other is for children and will begin one month later.
In order to avoid making mistakes during this pilot project, a good orientation was necessary. I chose to make a two week visit to an established team in order to learn of their experiences and mistakes. In November, 2005 I visited the team at the University Clinic of Navarra, Pamplona , lead by Dr. Carlos Centen. My travel was made possible by a grant provided by the IAHPC Traveling Scholarships program.
During my visit I was integrated into all of the activities of the team - ward visits, outpatient clinic, scientific meetings, conferences and team meetings. I also spent one day with another palliative care team in the Hospital of Navarra in order to observe different approaches to similar problems.
It was a great pleasure for me to be in the middle of real teams. Team work is easy to describe, but hard to put into practice. I observed very good communication (a cornerstone in palliative care) between both patients and their families and professionals. The working relationship between the palliative care team and the oncology team, lead by Dr Jesus Garcia-Foncillas, is quite remarkable and makes the care of the patient easier for both.
Since the experience and knowledge of the team in Pamplona is very useful to us, we have planned further collaborative work. I would like to thank IAHPC for making this meeting possible and for providing the support of my travel and to the team in Pamplona for all their help.
  
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